Just started to explore the DNG profile editor, and while all functions seem to work as described, I realized that many things are still unclear for me. So at the risk of asking some basic questions:

/> Is it possible to see and access the recipe of color adjustments with any given base profile? It seems, when opening a dng file with the profile editor and/or selecting any base profile such as e.g. Adobe Standard or Camera Standard or a Custom profile, the color list box stays empty - even though color adjustments might be in-built and could therefore be suited for re-editing.

/> What would be the influence of the base profile: Adobe Standard vs Camera Standard when creating a Custom profile via the Chart Wizard? As I understand, the resulting custom color adjustments are set on the top (relative to the base profile) and do not replace the in-built shifts (relative to the baseline matrices for D65/A illuminants)? I think my concern is to create a more complex profile than needed, by setting color adjustments on color adjustments.

/> With a new camera which is just supported since ACR 5.2, how can the baseline profile titled Matrix be accessed?

/> What makes the difference between the Adobe Standard profile and a Custom profile (created via the chart wizard)? Is it just about unit-to-unit deviations with the camera, or, if my camera were 'the same' would my Custom profile be essentially be the same as the Adobe Standard profile? I’m asking because actually my Custom profile is significantly different.

/> Is it possible to create a Custom Camera Standard profile, to match the color appearance produced by my camera - now assuming that there unit-to-unit deviations involved?

/> With a new camera which is just supported since ACR 5.2, how can the baseline profile titled Matrix be accessed?

Referring to this point, I figured out how to accomplish it:

With a camera such as the G10 which is newly supported since CR 5.2, the Camera profiles offered are Adobe Standard as well as 5 Camera matching profiles. The baseline profile titled Matrix is hidden (see DNG profile editor FAQs).

Accordingly, I temporarily deleted the Adobe Standard profile as well as the 5 CM profiles from their respective location. In Windows XP this is :\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfilesAlso I deleted some custom profiles which I had created in the meantime :\Documents and Settings\User\Application Data\Adobe\CameraRaw\CameraProfiles

Now when opening a Raw file in ACR, the only camera profile offered is Matrix (which was hidden before). The Raw file with this profile embedded can be saved as a dng. Upon opening this dng with the Profile editor, the profile titled Matrix appears as the base profile. It can be used as the starting point for editing (which is my main intention here), or it can be exported unaltered as a DNG camera profile. Finally, after restoring the deleted profiles (Adobe Standard + 5 CM profiles) this baseline Matrix profile is available in ACR as well.

However, in the meantime it has turned out that I got particularly confused by the following statement: "It is important to understand that all color adjustments made in the DNG Profile Editor are defined relative to a base profile."

When running the chart wizard on a DNG raw file of the ColorChecker, the Base profile silently changes from whatever it was before, e.g. Adobe Standard, to a new Base profile named ColorChecker. As far as I can tell, this is right the same as the baseline Matrix profile mentioned above. Consequently the color adjustments are made relative to the baseline matrices, but not relative to any preexisting table of color adjustments.

This answers some of my initial questions, except, maybe in particular the last one:how to create a customized Camera Matching profile?While the canned CM profiles don’t seem to give me the ‘DPP look’.

. . . I got particularly confused by the following statement: "It is important to understand that all color adjustments made in the DNG Profile Editor are defined relative to a base profile."

Yes, the DNG profile editor requires you to start with an existing profile and a photo (of a chart or other scene). When using the chart it's best (IMO) to have two photos. One taken at D65 lighting, the other at 2850˚K. The caveat is that your lighting must be absolutely correct in terms of color temperature and evenness across the chart. The tutorial shows how to make a DNG profile from both photos at once.

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When running the chart wizard on a DNG raw file of the ColorChecker, the Base profile silently changes from whatever it was before, e.g. Adobe Standard, to a new Base profile named ColorChecker.

(Or whatever name you choose) I'm guessing that the base profile has some elements that are required, but that the resultant profile is not merely an "adjustment" of the existing profile. But that's just a guess.

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As far as I can tell, this is right the same as the baseline Matrix profile mentioned above. Consequently the color adjustments are made relative to the baseline matrices, but not relative to any preexisting table of color adjustments.

I don't know. But from this assumption, you're wondering about what "influences" the base profile will have on the new one, if any, yes? I think that's a valid point, but I have no answers for you.

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This answers some of my initial questions, except, maybe in particular the last one:how to create a customized Camera Matching profile?While the canned CM profiles don’t seem to give me the ‘DPP look’.

I'm hoping to achieve results similar to DPP also by producing my own DNG profiles. I really like the files processed through that program, but I want to be able to use Bridge and a DNG workflow. Otherwise I'd stick to using DPP and Raw Developer. I was able to get results very similar to DPP when using Raw Developer in just a few hours. In addition, when using an ICC profile in Raw Developer my results had very accurate color. My choice of which program to use depends on what output I want and/or need. I have yet to get spot-on color output from ACR, but I've used it only for testing since CS4 was released.

I'm now plowing through the book, Real World Camera Raw and like the workflow the Adobe team has developed, but I haven't used it enough for a live job.

I find no difference in the DNG file and the original Raw file including the profiles when opening the DNG with Photoshop CS3 raw converter. You didn't say your software package CS? or Elements or Lightroom...etc..I use DNG for two reasons.. first I use a 5DmkII and would have to upgrade to CS4 (fromCS3) just to the get the RawConverter for CR2 files for my camera.. second it open the door to use many different Raw Converters, I like Capture One best, but lightroom can read the CR2 Raw and convert them to DNG and them I can read them in CS3 extended.. Same profiles are available in both..Since I only shoot in Raw, the profile editor has little use for my needs.Don

When running the Chart wizard on a DNG raw file of the ColorChecker, the Base profile silently changes from whatever it was before, e.g. Adobe Standard, to a new Base profile named ColorChecker.

Quote from: Chris_Brown

(Or whatever name you choose) I'm guessing that the base profile has some elements that are required, but that the resultant profile is not merely an "adjustment" of the existing profile. But that's just a guess.

Just to detail this, the name for this new Base profile: “ColorChecker” does not come from me. It shows up automatically after running the Chart wizard, whatever the initial Base profile was before.

Further, it can be shown that this new Base profile: “ColorChecker” is de facto identical to the baseline profile titled “Matrix” (obtained according post #2). A proof in principle just requires to run the Chart Wizard, then clear all color adjustments and save (export) the resulting profile. Then, back in ACR, the new profile derived from said Base profile “ColorChecker” and the baseline “Matrix” produce identical colors.

This might also answer the question about the influence of the initially selected Base profile (before running the Chart wizard), for example Adobe Standard vs Camera Standard. While both drop back to this Base profile “ColorChecker”, there is no influence as far as the color adjustments from the Chart wizard are concerned. Nonetheless, the initial profile (Adobe Standard vs Camera Standard) can introduce a different tone curve, or let’s better call it tonal tweaks compared to the ACR shipping defaults. With Camera Standard it’s a steeper curve, but I prefer the more moderate tonality resulting from Adobe Standard as the initially selected Base profile.

Quote from: Chris_Brown

I'm hoping to achieve results similar to DPP also by producing my own DNG profiles. I really like the files processed through that program, but I want to be able to use Bridge and a DNG workflow. Otherwise I'd stick to using DPP and Raw Developer. ... I have yet to get spot-on color output from ACR, but I've used it only for testing since CS4 was released.

Yes, such DPP match was my initial claim as well, however, in the meantime and after some further testing I’m wondering if this is really the right way (for me) to go. For example, in some aspects I liked the color reproduction of Provia film much more. So why introduce color shifts and gradients when not all of it are needed and/or different ones may be preferred.

Now, a fairly accurate profile (‘scene calorimetric’, ignoring tonality) can be easily obtained by means of the DNG profile editor via the Chart wizard. It’s interesting to study the effect of such profile on real world images in Camera Raw. I would say that it’s not too far away from finally pleasing. Maybe closer as a starting point than all the canned profiles.

In a nutshell, with such ‘accurate’ profile global saturation is often too high for my taste. Which however does not result directly from the profile, it’s a side effect from the tonal settings in ACR (i.e. Blacks and Contrast). However, it can be counterbalanced e.g. by reducing the saturation of the profile a bit (in the course of creating it). Aside, it mainly seems to be a question of tweaking some key memory colors a bit, such as in particular Blue sky and Yellow green (plant green). Again, this can now be accomplished via the Profile editor. That way, the resulting profile is really nice as I have to say. At least, it seems to be worth to elaborate this approach further.

Is it possible to see and access the recipe of color adjustments with any given base profile?

No. A profile basically contains a set of matrices and lookup tables (as well as an optional tone curve). A recipe contains a list of color adjustments that are used to derive these matrices and LUTs. For base profiles, the adjustments have already been "baked into" the LUTs and hence are no longer explicitly listed, as they are in recipes.

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What would be the influence of the base profile: Adobe Standard vs Camera Standard when creating a Custom profile via the Chart Wizard? As I understand, the resulting custom color adjustments are set on the top (relative to the base profile) and do not replace the in-built shifts (relative to the baseline matrices for D65/A illuminants)? I think my concern is to create a more complex profile than needed, by setting color adjustments on color adjustments.

The difference lies almost exclusively in the profiles' LUTs. These two base profiles contain different LUTs with different visual effects. (There are also some differences in the profiles' tone curves.)

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With a new camera which is just supported since ACR 5.2, how can the baseline profile titled Matrix be accessed?

You already discovered how to do this.

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What makes the difference between the Adobe Standard profile and a Custom profile (created via the chart wizard)? Is it just about unit-to-unit deviations with the camera, or, if my camera were 'the same' would my Custom profile be essentially be the same as the Adobe Standard profile? I’m asking because actually my Custom profile is significantly different.

You also discovered this. All of the Adobe-provided profiles for a given camera have the same matrix, but different LUTs. The "Matrix" profile is the same color rendering as our older-style "ACR x.y" profiles such as ACR 4.4, etc.

Using the Chart Wizard to build your own profile will result in a different LUT than the one we produce for Adobe Standard and the other Camera Matching profiles. Hence the result will be different.

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Is it possible to create a Custom Camera Standard profile, to match the color appearance produced by my camera - now assuming that there unit-to-unit deviations involved?

Not sure what the description "color appearance produced by my camera" means. Please clarify this.

No. A profile basically contains a set of matrices and lookup tables (as well as an optional tone curve). A recipe contains a list of color adjustments that are used to derive these matrices and LUTs. For base profiles, the adjustments have already been "baked into" the LUTs and hence are no longer explicitly listed, as they are in recipes.

That makes sense. I do think it would be nice if I could "retrieve" the tone curve from a DNG Profile if it's present, so that I could apply to one of my own "recipes". For instance, I may decide that I want to use the Chart Wizard as the starting point for my profile because I feel it gives me better colors as far as hues go; but if I like the tone curve of "D2X Mode1" for instance, it would be nice if I could load that curve and apply it to my Chart Wizard recipe to create my ideal profile.

Aside, it mainly seems to be a question of tweaking some key memory colors a bit, such as in particular Blue sky and Yellow green (plant green). Again, this can now be accomplished via the Profile editor. That way, the resulting profile is really nice as I have to say.

I've taken a similar approach. For the most part I like the results of a Chart Wizard profile, the only issue I have is foliage in landscape shots - it comes out too yellowish. While this is probably more accurate, it's not _pleasing_ after being used to seeing those Velvia greens in pictures as far back as I can remember. So I tweak the Chart Wizard recipe to give more pleasing foliage to create my "Landscape" profile. Works great.

Many thanks for your response,and my high esteem for the Profile editor as well as the whole new Camera profile setup.

Quote from: madmanchan

Not sure what the description "color appearance produced by my camera" means. Please clarify this.

Let me expand the question a bit. Say we create a Custom camera profile by using the ColorChecker according tutorials 5 or 6 of the DNG profile editor documentation. As I understand, it will yield a fairly accurate profile (hue-sat.-accurate) which should provide a common, consistent starting point - essentially independent from the camera model as well as possible device-to device deviations. Now what would be a basic recipe for color adjustments in order to shift this state ('scene colorimetric' rendition) to a pleasing rendition? Which (key) colors to move, and where?

I'm aware that this is also a question of personal taste and other factors effecting color perception such as e.g. the cultural background. However, a converter such as DPP and its broadly accepted color reproduction seem to suggest that there's a kind of statistical average or maybe least common denominator regarding color perception and what is called a preferred rendition. What would be the best way to use the output from DPP Raw conversion as the target when working with the DNG profile editor? Doing it on a pure visual basis can be quite hard (as I find), so I'm wondering if there's any way to bring in the ColorChecker again (?).

Thanks for the suggestion, Jeff. I'll keep this in mind for potential future updates to the DNG PE. In the meantime you can (much less conveniently) accomplish the same thing by setting up a custom default tone curve for your camera.

Peter, the Canon color rendering may be popular among Canon users but isn't standardized. The Picture Styles essentially represent the results of Canon's user market studies. Prior to 2005 (i.e., before Picture Styles came along), the current equivalent of Neutral was pretty close to the default on the older 1-series cameras, like the 1D Mark II. It was reasonably accurate but boring. Some Canon users were fine with it, but many didn't like it. In response to user feedback, Canon created the current Picture Styles and made Standard the default, instead of Neutral. Nikon, Pentax, Sony, etc. have their own flavor of Standard, and they're all different.

To answer your specific question, there is not really an easy way to use the DNG PE to create a DPP-like profile, even with the aid of a ColorChecker. Please keep in mind that PE was really designed with profile tweaking in mind, rather than building a full-fledged profile from scratch. As such, it does not contain the full set of tools and interface that one would normally need to build a DPP-like profile. The PE is mostly designed to help users deal with problem colors; i.e, you find a profile that is mostly to your liking, except for a few colors that appear off (in your mind, at least). You have example images that demonstrate the issue. You open those images into PE and add color control points and attempt to fix those colors. Additional images can be opened to verify the generality of your fix.

Some types of DPP-like color behavior can be achieved with the DNG PE. For example, saturation-dependent hue twists can be achieved, e.g., by making more saturated reds push towards magenta and less saturated reds push towards orange. This is done via a control point in the more saturated reds that points downward, and another control point in the less saturated reds that is directed upward.

Please keep in mind that PE was really designed with profile tweaking in mind, rather than building a full-fledged profile from scratch. As such, it does not contain the full set of tools and interface that one would normally need to build a DPP-like profile. The PE is mostly designed to help users deal with problem colors; i.e, you find a profile that is mostly to your liking, except for a few colors that appear off (in your mind, at least). You have example images that demonstrate the issue. You open those images into PE and add color control points and attempt to fix those colors. Additional images can be opened to verify the generality of your fix.

After I read this, I realized I had been working with the DNG PE under some wrong assumptions and am now confused.

When using the Chart method, how is PE changing a profile? Is it because I've selected a profile in the PE or because I've saved the raw DNG with a specific camera profile?

To answer your specific question, there is not really an easy way to use the DNG PE to create a DPP-like profile, even with the aid of a ColorChecker. Please keep in mind that PE was really designed with profile tweaking in mind, rather than building a full-fledged profile from scratch. As such, it does not contain the full set of tools and interface that one would normally need to build a DPP-like profile. The PE is mostly designed to help users deal with problem colors; i.e, you find a profile that is mostly to your liking, except for a few colors that appear off (in your mind, at least). You have example images that demonstrate the issue. You open those images into PE and add color control points and attempt to fix those colors. Additional images can be opened to verify the generality of your fix.

Eric, - many thanks for explanation! It's good to understand the idea. No problem to agree that it's probably better to leave the full-fledged profiling and color matching to the experts and their pro tools.

Another issue I encountered in the course of trying to emulate DPP, is that the numerical difference between 'colorimetric' (hue-sat.-accurate) and 'pleasing' can be rather small. For example, DPP apparently likes to render blue sky with a slight shift towards purple. Looks nice as I find, however, it's just approx. 5° hue. Clearly visible, and of course it's possible to trace this with the ColorChecker as well, but considering any possible sources of measuring error, 5° hue are just +/- 0.7% in terms of a deviation. So it probably makes less sense (for me) to establish such color shifts based on the numbers only. Which finally leads back to a visually driven approach as you suggest.

FWIW - I've outlined the procedure which so far seems to give me the 'best' profile and colors in Camera Raw (see below). Of course it also reflects my personal taste, and general validity may be limited. Nonetheless, comments are of course appreciated.

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Some types of DPP-like color behavior can be achieved with the DNG PE. For example, saturation-dependent hue twists can be achieved, e.g., by making more saturated reds push towards magenta and less saturated reds push towards orange. This is done via a control point in the more saturated reds that points downward, and another control point in the less saturated reds that is directed upward.

Interesting! What would be a good sample image in order to see the relevance of these color adjustments? Maybe a sunset?

Peter

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/> Open a DNG image of the ColorChecker in the Profile Editor./> Select Base Profile: Adobe Standard if this is not already given./> Select the Color Matrices pane and increase global saturation by setting the respective sliders for Red, Green and Blue Saturation to + 5./> Select the Chart tab, place the four colored circles and run the Chart wizard./> Select the Color Matrices pane again and reset all sliders back to zero./> Save the Recipe (if desired) and export the new profile./> Close the Profile Editor and re-launch it again (not sure if this is really necessary but can't be wrong).

/> Open the DNG image of the ColorChecker in the Profile Editor again./> Select the new Base Profile i.e. the one created above./> White-balance the image via right-click on the second gray (patch # 20)./> Click on the three primary color patches: Blue # 13, Green # 14 and Red # 15 as well as the Light Skin patch # 2. This creates respective color control points and "locks down" these colors, thus preventing them from getting changed./> Click on the Blue sky patch # 3 and adjust the Hue to +5/> Click on the Yellow Green patch # 11, adjust the Hue to -5 and Lightness to -5/> Save the Recipe (if desired) and export the new profile.Done.

I've taken a similar approach. For the most part I like the results of a Chart Wizard profile, ...

Quote from: JeffKohn

... but if I like the tone curve of "D2X Mode1" for instance, it would be nice if I could load that curve and apply it to my Chart Wizard recipe to create my ideal profile.

When you select any Base profile which includes your preferred tone curve, and then run the Chart wizard, my believe was that this tone curve is maintained while only the Lut of color adjustments gets replaced.

When you select any Base profile which includes your preferred tone curve, and then run the Chart wizard, my believe was that this tone curve is maintained while only the Lut of color adjustments gets replaced.

Peter

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I don't think that's the way it work, at least that not what the DNG PE seems to indicate. The base profile automatically gets changed to something like "ColorChecker" when you run the chart wizard. (I don't recall exactly what the profile gets changed to, but I am pretty sure it gets automatically changed).

Jeff, - have you tried? I did by creating a profile which includes a nonsense curve, exported it, re-launched the Profile editor, selected this profile as the Base profile and ran the Chart wizard. The nonsense curve survived (obvious from the image but not drawn any more in the Tone Curve pane).

Some types of DPP-like color behavior can be achieved with the DNG PE. For example, saturation-dependent hue twists can be achieved, e.g., by making more saturated reds push towards magenta and less saturated reds push towards orange.

Quote from: madmanchan

Peter, you could try an image of a person wearing a saturated red sweater. That way you get skin tones and deep reds in the same shot.

Ah ok. Actually I’m not so sure if such dislocation of skin tones towards orange, or any lateral shift away from hue-sat.-accuracy, is something a profile should do by default. That’s why I locked the Light skin patch down in above procedure. Once I came across a Kodak patent (US 6,791,716) which suggested to center skin towards a specific hue angle rather than moving them just in one direction. Interesting idea at least.

Anyway – in the meantime I think I figured out why the canned profile, Camera Standard didn’t work so well for me. Aside from some slightly deviating hues vs DPP, it is simply about color saturation. For the purpose of comparison I had set ACR and particular the tonal controls to their shipping defaults (Blacks 5, Contrast 25, etc.). As a side effect, there’s an increase of saturation which depending on color ranges up to 10% or so. I really should have noticed this earlier.